Carbs and sugars in nutrition info

[sweenyb]

Hi. New to the forum and new to type 2.
I've been told I need to restrict my carb intake. I've done all the right things regarding swapping white for brown, eat more veg and whole food and have started a low impact exercise programme, but I am really confused about the sugar in carbs info.
Am I meant to only count the sugar content of the carbs when working out what to eat against the fibre content, or am I to take the whole carb value into account.
Looking for help. Thanks

 

[grovesy]

Carbs are turned into sugar by the body, it is the total carbs to watch.

 

[Drummer]

If you are fully type two then your swaps will probably not have much effect - brown bread has about the same carbs as white, same with rice and pasta etc.
It is advice commonly given, and it shouldn't be, really.
It muddies the water for those just starting out trying to control their diabetes - and type two really is all about the carbohydrates.
Some veges are high in starch, whole grain is high starch - best avoided if you are a full on type two.
If you are in the UK the carbohydrates do not include the fibre, so the first figure is the one you go by. Sugar is a carbohydrate, so it is just showing the ratio between the simple sugars and the complex starches, but unless you are using insulin or some other glucose reducing medication it isn't all that important.

 

[CathyB]

Hi @sweenyb
As the others have said, it is the full carb count, things to avoid are potatoes, rice, pasta, bread (Burgen is a lower carb soy & linseed that many of us use, Sainsbury’s also do a seeded low carb option), root veg is higher in sugar as are peas, best veg is grown above the ground, so cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower. Beware of the natural sugar in fruit, especially tropical fruits which are best avoided but some can tolerate a few strawberries or blueberries, I can’t sadly but I can now have a couple of small apples a day.
Testing your blood is key to working out what foods work for you but your gp is unlikely to give you a meter as a type 2 unless you are on insulin, code free is the cheapest. Have a look at other threads, you will find all that you need here on the forum, ask any questions you have as everyone here knows how hard it can be to get started.
At first the changes can feel overwhelming but once you get your head around it things are easier. I spent a week sulking, convinced I would starve to death!! Now I love my diet and would never go back to my old habits no matter what

 

[rebrascora]

If you are fully type two then your swaps will probably not have much effect - brown bread has about the same carbs as white, same with rice and pasta etc.
It is advice commonly given, and it shouldn't be, really.
It muddies the water for those just starting out trying to control their diabetes - and type two really is all about the carbohydrates.
Some veges are high in starch, whole grain is high starch - best avoided if you are a full on type two.
If you are in the UK the carbohydrates do not include the fibre, so the first figure is the one you go by. Sugar is a carbohydrate, so it is just showing the ratio between the simple sugars and the complex starches, but unless you are using insulin or some other glucose reducing medication it isn't all that important.

@Drummer Can you explain the latter part of your post that I have highlighted. Just wondering why the sugars should be more relevant to insulin users..... wondering if I have missed something? The reason I ask is that I had a Nature Valley Salted Caramel Protein bar last night as an "on the run" snack which is about 10g carbs, 5 of which are sugar. I took one unit of NovoRapid 15mins before and was 8.1. 4hrs later when I left the theatre to drive home I had dropped to 4.5 despite a few little tastes of my sisters ice cream. Obviously, I had to take a dextrose tablet to bring me up so that I could drive home but then dropped again when I got home. My friend who was with me at the time seems to think it is the sugars in the Protein Bar but I understood that I take a unit of insulin for every 10g carbs in general, so your comment made me wonder if I had picked things up wrong. I rarely eat sweet stuff these days and try to stay very low carb even with insulin but just need to know if there is some relevance to your comment, for the odd occasion when I do treat myself.

 

[rebrascora]

@sweenyb
Welcome from me too. Sorry to hijack your post above. You have been given excellent advice already. It takes a bit of getting your head around at first and lots of trial and error but once you start to figure it out, it soon becomes the new normal and I too can say that I probably enjoy my food more now that I am eating low carb and lots of fresh veg and more fat. I no longer eat bread and usually just have 2 or 3 small potatoes on an evening as my main source of carbs.

 

[Ditto]

Hello and welcome to the forum. 🙂

I would also recommend a book called Can I Eat That? by Jenefer Roberts which is full of dietary information specific to Type 2.Martin

Thanks for the rec, I've just ordered it from the library.

 

[Drummer]

@Drummer Can you explain the latter part of your post that I have highlighted. Just wondering why the sugars should be more relevant to insulin users..... wondering if I have missed something? The reason I ask is that I had a Nature Valley Salted Caramel Protein bar last night as an "on the run" snack which is about 10g carbs, 5 of which are sugar. I took one unit of NovoRapid 15mins before and was 8.1. 4hrs later when I left the theatre to drive home I had dropped to 4.5 despite a few little tastes of my sisters ice cream. Obviously, I had to take a dextrose tablet to bring me up so that I could drive home but then dropped again when I got home. My friend who was with me at the time seems to think it is the sugars in the Protein Bar but I understood that I take a unit of insulin for every 10g carbs in general, so your comment made me wonder if I had picked things up wrong. I rarely eat sweet stuff these days and try to stay very low carb even with insulin but just need to know if there is some relevance to your comment, for the odd occasion when I do treat myself.

I have read posts which reported problems where the fast uptake of the sugars did not match the curve of the activity of the particular insulin - the consensus was that the insulin was still working after it was needed - I think that the problem is more significant there the food eaten is low in fat, as that slows down the digestion - but this is just relying on my memory and it would be a good idea to ask the question in a separate thread to attract insulin users who have probably had direct experience of the phenomenon.

 

[Sally71]

@rebrascora you are correct in that you count the total carbs to calculate your insulin dose, the "of which sugars" is completely useless information in that sense. Trying to match your food to the insulin profile is nigh on impossible, you'd have a very restricted set of foods you could eat if you tried to do that. But by trial and error you can perhaps learn that certain foods need to be handled in a different way. For example, if my daughter eats porridge, I have to tell her pump to drip the dose in slowly over 90 minutes or so, if I give it to her all up front then she will go hypo because the insulin will be working faster than the food. That's nothing to do with how much sugar is in it, just that porridge oats are slow burn. Other cereals tend to make her shoot into the stratosphere, but once the insulin gets going she comes back down again and it all balances out in the end, we could perhaps get round this by doing the bolus earlier to give the insulin chance to get going before the food is eaten, daughter usually doesn't remember to do that though It's all a bit of a minefield, and what works for one person probably doesn't work for another, personally I've never found the "of which sugars" info to be of any use, maybe some people do find it helpful

 

[rebrascora]

@sweenyb
Thanks, that makes sense.

@Sally71
Many thanks for your reply. That ties in with the problems I had eating a Sugared Out Muesli bar for breakfast.... going hypo despite taking the appropriate amount of insulin.

I have done some experimenting with prebolussing and lots of testing this morning and I am learning lots from it. The increased finger pricking is giving me a much clearer picture of what is going on and making me realise just how valuable CGM must be. I am going to continue very frequent testing for a few more days and see how much info I gain and then decide whether to go for a Dexcom G6. I think it could be really motivating to see exactly what is happening both with food and exercise as well as how the insulin operates and when is best to pre bolus. Doubt I could afford Dexcom long term, but I could rack up a lot of info over a couple of months.

Again, apologies to @sweenyb for hijacking your thread. I will not continue further here but perhaps start a new thread.

 

[trophywench]

Good grief, Rebrascora! Are you made of money? Much cheaper to invest in a Libre than a Dexcom, surely?

 

[rebrascora]

Good grief, Rebrascora! Are you made of money? Much cheaper to invest in a Libre than a Dexcom, surely?

Quite the opposite actually as I am low income but I do have some savings and the Libre has not been available to new customers for some time. I am also lead to believe that the Dexcom is a superior system. I was thinking of just getting the starter pack which I understand covers you for a couple of months and see how I get on. I couldn't afford it long term but hope that I might build up a significant raft of info during that time period. My thinking is that my health and wellbeing is worth spending my savings/birthday money on, although I haven't made a final decision yet.

 

[trophywench]

Starter kit is 3 sensors and a reader, sposed to last you a month since you're supposed to change the sensor every 10 days, dunno if it can be restarted to last longer than 10 or not. There again at £159 it's much more expensive than intensive testing - and of course would need to be repeated when your body or your diabetes changes - cos neither stays the same forever, as the longer you have diabetes, you discover.

 

[rebrascora]

Thanks for that correction.... I have read so much info recently I am struggling to retain even half of it. I have read that the sensors can be restarted to squeeze a bit more life out of them but I would guess that their reliability is not guaranteed after the 10 day period. I think where I got mixed up was that I was intending to buy 2 starter kits.to last me 2 months. I still have a way to go research wise before I commit to the purchase though and might just buy myself a bulk purchase of more test strips and keep going with the finger pricking. I am a bit of a technophobe, so having got used to this process I am wary of changing to a different system.